Other states—such as Oregon, Alaska, California, Massachusetts, Maine, Nevada, as well as the District of Columbia—have followed Colorado and Washington’s lead and legalized recreational marijuana, and more are hopping onboard.

Weed is now legal along the entire Pacific Coast! How cool is that?

AND…over half of the 50 states have already legalized medical marijuana and there’s a good chance that recreational marijuana will soon be legal on a federal level.

Not only is there an enormous amount of weed being grown and sold right now, a lot of jobs are opening to meet the demand—marijuana is one helluva big employer.

Profits. Employment. Tax revenue.

We are booming. And the boom will only continue to get bigger.

Between recreational and medical marijuana, sales in the United States rose from $4.6 billion in 2014 to $5.4 billion in 2015. That’s a 17.4% increase.

And sales are expected to soar to $6.7 billion this year (2016)—a 25% increase.

And check this out…

By 2020, it’s estimated we’ll hit $21.8 billion.

$21.8 billion!

$21,800,000,000.00

That’s a lot of damn money.

And that doesn’t even include revenue from grow equipment, nutrients, smoking devices, etc.

That’s $21.8 million in weed alone.

Imagine what it’s going to be like.

Can you see it, smell it, and taste it?

I can.

But so can Big Marijuana.

Many commercial growers realized their days of cultivation for profit were numbered when, while watching this year’s NBA playoffs, they saw the 30-second commercial for the hydroponics company Black Magic, with products available exclusively at Home Depot.

A national ad for hydroponics products during an NBA playoff?

Products at Home Depot?

Damn…

The subtext was clear:

Big Marijuana has arrived.

What was once a passion for the few and the proud is now morphing into big business for those with the deepest pockets (and, as history has proven, the coldest hearts).

Now this commercial upset a lot of growers.

And not just because they realized their primary source of income may soon be drying up, but because they understood something far more sinister was a work.

But before I go into specifics, it’s important to understand that…

Knowing that the marijuana economy can dump huge sums of money in their laps, big money investors are dying to get into our industry right now.

Microsoft is even on board, announcing in June that it would partner with Kind Financial, a company that develops software financial technology for the cannabis industry.

States that have legalized recreational marijuana are eager for these investors to help finance their piece of the booming weed industry.

The Washington State Liquor and Cannabis Board eliminated the six-month residency requirement for investors, inviting investors from around the United States to own as much as 49% of an operation.

Oregon has approved similar rules.

And Colorado will most likely follow and do away with the two-year residency requirement for marijuana financiers.

Now, on top of out-of-state investors with deep pockets and big plans, there’s no shortage of in-state investors willing to put their money into our growing industry—investors who’ve never grown a single plant themselves, and many of whom have never even taken a hit off a joint (okay, well, they smoked once with Bill Clinton, but didn’t inhale).

Fortunately, right now this is on a state level.

But imagine what’s going to happen when marijuana is legal on a federal level.

That’s when the REAL mushroom-cloud-laying motherfuckers will get in the game, ready and able to demolish whatever and—with the exception of a few brave souls—whoever is in their path.

Here’s what’s going to happen…

Today, if someone lives in a fairly progressive state, they typically go to a dispensary or retail marijuana store to buy their cannabis. There, they can pick out a strain that gives them the type of feeling they want. They might buy candies, baked goods, or lozenges, but for the most part they’re picking up flowers.

Now, like I spoke about recently in another recent post, in the next five to ten years, while that dispensary or retail marijuana store may still exist, the majority of users will buy their cannabis at convenience stores and grocery stores.

Lori Ajax – California’s first weed czar

Bureaucrats who’ve transferred from alcohol control to cannabis control, such as Lori Ajax, the first chief of California’s Bureau of Medical Marijuana Regulation, will want to follow the model they’re familiar with—a model they understand—which means plugging marijuana distribution into the current distribution outlets for alcohol. Which, by the way, are the same distribution points for cigarettes.

And who already has distribution set up amongst these stores?

That’s right. Big Alcohol and Big Tobacco.

They’ll easily swoop in and replicate the model they currently have in place, while the rest of the industry brawls over crumbs in the carpet.

Now, as I write this, a lot of consumers 45 and over still like to smoke flowers.

But consumers younger than 45 prefer edibles and concentrates.

In fact, e-cigs, vape pens, and edibles are the fastest-growing sectors in the marketplace. And edibles are currently responsible for 50% of Colorado’s gross marijuana revenue.

But in the future…

Everyone but a SMALL handful of old-timers will consume some form of concentrate.

They’ll consume it in an edible, pill, vape pen, e-cig, or in a cream.

And that product will be standardized, branded, and marketed just like Coca Cola.

Here’s why…

What most of the world doesn’t realize yet is that we’re wired for weed—literally—via our endocannabinoid system.

This system helps control basic physiological processes like pain modulation, memory, appetite, and immune system responses.

And CBD, CBN, and THC—the main cannabinoids in cannabis, the chemicals that get you high—fit like lock and key into these receptors.

When consumers go to the store, they’re going pick out their marijuana products based on what problem they want it to solve or how they want it to make them feel.

The average user is not going to worry about strain. Strains matter to growers. Outcome is what matters to users.

And consumers will make their purchases based on the outcome they want.

They’ll choose products with labels that state the outcome right on the bottle.

Currently, edible users are ahead of the curve. They’re far more interested in outcome than they are what strain the source material for the concentrate inside their candy originated from.

The rest of the market will soon follow.

Now, not only will consumers purchase outcomes over strains…

They’ll expect to achieve the same outcome every time they use a product. (I discuss this in detail in a brand new free report I’ll soon be sending you.)

Consistency and outcome is the future. The near future.

In fact, consumers will soon be able to download their genetic profile, get it analyzed, and, within minutes, know the cannabinoid and terpene profile they’ll react best to and that will provide them with their desired result.

And while picking up coffee, toilet paper, and body lotion at the grocery store, they’ll grab the concentrate (or products made with concentrates) that match their genetic profile.

But that’s not all…

I predict by 2025 a lot of marijuana on the market will be grown with CRISPR (clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats) technology.

CRISPR technology will produce genetically modified marijuana that can be manipulated to thrive not only both indoors or outdoors, but based specifically on where—geographically—it’s grown outdoors.

Not only that, but it will also generate cannabis to meet the precise outcomes consumers desire.

In the future, only a small number of hobbyists will grow and smoke marijuana like we do today.

Don’t get me wrong, people will still consume cannabis to get high. But when they pick out their product, they’ll be thinking about what kind of high they want to have. Do they want to be more creative? Do they want to relax? Do they want to have great sex?

It’ll tell you right on the label what that product will do for you, what it contains, and what the dosage is—just like over-the-counter drugs do.

And soon, when the world thinks about marijuana, they’re not going to think potheads.

They’re going to think of the woman who takes cannabis for postpartum depression or as part of her skin-care regimen.

They’re going to think of the guy who takes a little to help his ADD or who drinks a cannabis shake after his workout for muscle repair.

But probably more likely than any of these, cannabis will be so ubiquitous that when you think about the person who uses it, you’re not going to think about anybody in particular at all.

And because of this ubiquity, the gold rush is going to take off like a bat out of hell. It will hit colossal proportions.

Colorado was just the beginning.

In 2020, the cannabis industry will be bigger than the NFL.

In 2030, it’ll be bigger than beer.

And soon after that, it will be bigger than wheat, corn, and soybeans combined.

There’s huge opportunity in our industry for the right people.

But where there’s opportunity and profit, there’s also corruption.

Remember that commercial for Black Magic that aired during the NBA playoffs I told you about?

And how unsettling it was for our community?

What I didn’t tell you was that Black Magic is actually a subsidiary of Scott’s Miracle-Gro.

Back in 2011, I warned growers we’d likely see GMO, pesticide, herbicide, and chemical companies like Monsanto and Scotts Miracle-Gro try to devour our precious industry.

And I correctly predicted that Maximum Yield Magazine, General Hydroponics, and other collaborators would facilitate entry of corporate giants like Monsanto and Scotts Miracle-Gro into the hydroponics marketplace.

I also warned that the Scotts Miracle-Gro marijuana industry buyout would harm local hydroponics stores by undercutting them and selling hydroponics products via corporate retailers such as Home Depot and Wal-Mart.

And now it’s happening:

Since 2015, through a front company and via other methods, Scotts Miracle-Gro has purchased General Hydroponics (the #2 brand in the USA), Botanicare (the #5 brand in the USA) and Gavita Lights (the #1 lighting brand).

And Scotts is using its massive distribution channels at Home Depot to sell Black Magic.

This should be of great concern to every single grower, equipment manufacturer, and store owner in our community.

In fact, Scotts Miracle-Gro CEO, elite 1% millionaire Jim Hagedorn with his hundreds of millions of dollars to burn, announced he’s planning a Scotts Miracle-Gro marijuana takeover by investing $500 MILLION to commandeer the marijuana hydroponics nutrients, equipment, and retailing industries.

And make no mistake, Hagedorn aims to put small grow shops out of business completely.

A recent Forbes article said he compares the lawn and garden business to warfare. He’s quoted as saying:

“Today the way wars happen, you don’t get to keep all the stuff. To me this is one where in commercial combat you kind of rape and pillage, and you keep all of the stuff.”

Rape and pillage—his words, not mine.

Now is Scotts advertising that Black Magic is designed for marijuana? Of course not. They’re not part of our community, nor will they proudly stand up for you and the cannabis you grow.

So instead, with a wink wink and a nudge nudge, Scotts sells Black Magic for “tomato growers.”

The people who built the marijuana industry and showed the world marijuana is good medicine are the home growers, companies like Advanced Nutrients, seed breeders, cannabis retailers, hydroponics stores, and activists.

We’ve all put in years of hard work on the front lines.

And now corporate raiders like Scotts Miracle-Gro are out to steal our achievements and destroy as many of us as they can.

Monsanto and Scotts Miracle-Gro are convicted corporate criminals with long histories of abuses that harm people, animals, and the environment.

In another case, Scotts KNOWINGLY sold poisoned bird food that killed tens of thousands of birds, and got off with a small fine.

Monsanto and Scotts Miracle-Gro are longtime business partners and allies of the US military and drug war, producing and distributing deadly poisons sprayed by American drug warriors on people, animals, coca and marijuana plants, and forests in foreign countries such as Columbia.

The company sells its deadly poisons under the Ortho brand and now controls more than half of the consumer pesticides, fertilizers, soils, and grass seeds market.

And because Scotts Miracle-Gro has such a close business affiliation with Monsanto, one of the world’s leading GMO corporations, many analysts suspect that Scotts and Monsanto will team up to create GMO marijuana strains and seeds.

These of the kinds of motherfuckers taking over our industry.

Are they all as evil as Scotts?

Of course not.

However, they do all want to suck every penny out of our industry that they can, and away from all the hardworking growers in our community, many who’ve dedicated their lives to growing marijuana.

And, like Scotts, many of them have a history of dealing in poison and death.

Monsanto, who have a chokehold on the farming industry, campaigned like crazy to get cannabis legalized in Uruguay.

Now that it’s legal, they’re figuring out how to mass produce the same kind of Frankenplants they grow in the US.

Syqe received $33 million in total investments for this device and Big Pharma giant Teva holds exclusive marketing and distribution rights in Isreal. This is the first time a major pharmaceutical company has agreed to distribute a medical marijuana product. And one thing’s for certain: it won’t be the last.

So if you want to design and manufacture your own vape pens or e-cigs, you’ll need between $2 million and $10 million to meet the new guidelines.

Don’t have millions of dollars? Tough shit. Big Marijuana does. And the United States Government is more than happy to take it from them.

Given what’s going on in mass-produced agriculture, the fact that only 40% to 60% of what’s in a cigarette is actually tobacco, and the amount of money big pharmaceutical companies pump into Washington to maintain their competitive edge, we don’t have to stretch very far to imagine where this is going to go.

Right now, the giants are hiding in the shadows, gathering their troops, sharpening their weapons, and planning their assault.

And when the federal government legalizes marijuana, make no mistake, they will attack.

Just like Big Tobacco did to tobacco farmers, Big Marijuana will “rape and pillage” our community and squeeze out the bulk of the commercial growers.

How many mom and pop tobacco farmers you know of who make a good living today?

Not many. They’ve been squeezed out. Big Tobacco now owns that industry.

And Big Marijuana will soon own ours.

And it’ll be a cinch.

They have deep pockets, the right connections, and brilliant business minds at their disposal.

They have an army of lobbyists to ensure their weed is what goes to market, not yours.

They will use their immense resources to push for laws that would make it hard, if not impossible, for the average Joe to receive a license allowing them to grow for commercial purposes.

They will do everything in their power to make it so that every marijuana user in the world has to rely on THEM for their marijuana.

And, at least in America, their loyal allies—the United States Government, as well as state governments across the country—will help make sure of it.

Now, sure, you’ll be allowed to grow for personal use…

…but the days of running 25-light grows as a collective will soon be over.

Big Marijuana has come to drink your fucking milkshake.

I’m not trying to bum you out here.

What I’m trying to do is give you a clear picture of where we’re headed.

We love growing it, smelling it, smoking it, selling it, talking about it, and thinking about it, as well as surrounding ourselves with other people who love it.

You may even be a gazer like I am, staring at the colas in your garden for hours at a time, in a complete state of awe at the beauty that stands before you.

We do this because we love it, not just because we see dollar signs in it.

Many of us started with nothing except for our love of marijuana and a desire to get out of the rat race.

We’ve had to live in fear of the police kicking down our doors, hauling us off to jail and our plants to the incinerator.

Banks wouldn’t loan us money or allow us to open business accounts.

The entire system was against us.

We’ve given our lives to our grows and our businesses, and spilled gallons of blood, sweat, and tears to get to where we are.

Our heart is in this thing.

Our dedication is like that of a mother for her child.

If you’re as passionate about your cannabis business as I am, and are willing to educate yourself, take bold action, and do what the fuck needs to be done, then you will no doubt seize your share of the marijuana gold.

To help you I will soon be releasing a free report titled What Big Marijuana Doesn’tWant You to Know—And How to Kick Ass in the New Cannabis Economy.

Whether you’re a grower, own a retail weed store or hydroponic shop, manufacture edibles, vape pens, or growing equipment, or are looking to launch a business that has anything to do with marijuana, this report may be the most important thing you’ll ever read.

Because you’re going to discover…

Why our industry is ass backwards, how that’s about to change, and what this means to YOU.

Why strains will no longer matter.

What weed consumers will soon expect and DEMAND.

How and where cannabis will be grown.

The three roles of every weed entrepreneur (and which one you need to focus on most if you want to make big profits for a long time).

The Three Pillars of Pot Revenue

How small improvements most in our industry have no idea about can double, triple, or even quadruple your profits.

The one skill every marijuana entrepreneur must have.

The most important lessons I’ve learned over the past 33 years in the marijuana industry.

How I built an over $100-million-a-year cannabis business.

The most effective marketing methods (less than 1% of the people in our industry have ever heard of a style of marketing that makes me tens of millions of dollars each year).

You’re also going to learn how to…

Close more deals.

Make more sales.

Get more done in less time.

Overcome the many obstacles our community will soon face.

Influence partners, employees, distributors, and customers.

Outwit and outsell your competitors.

Become a leader others will want to follow.

Build a team of loyal, hardworking, productive workers.

Win more negotiations.

Systematize your operations.

Implement marketing strategies almost no one in our industry knows about.

Differentiate yourself from the competition.

Rise to the top of the market.

Make a killing in our industry no matter how hard Big Marijuana tries to force you out of business.

… and much more

Now, if you’re new to this blog and don’t know me yet, you may be wondering…

To put it simply, I’m a guy in the trenches who loves and is passionate about both marijuana and business.

And I’ve been involved in both longer than many marijuana growers and distributors have been alive.

In 2001, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police called me British Columbia’s Tony Soprano. A veritable Marijuana Don, they said. That I ran a conspiracy they estimated had produced and smuggled $50 million worth of marijuana from Canada into the United States in a 12-month period.

In 1983, after busting my tail to construct my first 500-square-foot grow room in the back of a lawn fertilizing business I owned, I sat back in a chair, victorious, admiring what I’d built.

I was in a state of wonder. It was like seeing the stars in the sky for the first time. Silly, I know. But to me it was a huge deal.

It was freedom.

I got so excited staring at those tiny plants that I masturbated.

And not once did the thought of a woman cross my mind. (And to all the wiseasses reading this: No, the thought of a man didn’t cross my mind either.)

The only females I thought of were the little green ones in the pots before me, climbing toward the life-giving lights overhead.

I contemplated how much bud they would yield, what it was going to smell like and taste like, and how much money I was going to make.

I pictured giant grows—in houses, warehouses, fields, and swamps.

And I saw piles of money—stacks of cash in duffle bags, safes, and safe-deposit boxes.

At 23 years old, leaning back in an old office chair with my lap rocket in my hand, gazing at my baby plants and grow room, the synapses in my brain forged new and powerful connections, linking marijuana, money, and sex, forever altering the course of my life.

I cracked the door to the room the next morning with excitement and anticipation—I was sooo pumped to see how my little green beauties had done overnight.

My heart sank…

Each and every one of them was dead—fried damn near to a crisp. I hadn’t properly ventilated the room, and the heat took the lives of my young plants—D’oh!

I’d killed my first crop.

Since then, I’ve successfully grown, and overseen the growing of, over

1,000,000 marijuana plants.

I’ve made more money in a month growing and selling weed than most people will see in their lifetime.

I’ve taken my company, Advanced Nutrients, which manufactures the #1 best-selling line of cannabis-specific nutrients in the world, from nothing to over $100 million a year in sales, with customers in over 100 countries across the globe. We employ hundreds of people and our nutrients are in more grow rooms than any other brand in the world.

So, I like to think I know a little bit about what I’m talking about.

I may have OCD, ADD, and dyslexia and gotten Cs, Ds, and Fs in history, English, and home economics (I couldn’t memorize boring facts, spell, or sew worth a damn, and the quiche I made tasted like cheesy asphalt)…

And I’ve fallen on my face countless times.

But weed and business are two subjects I’ve dedicated my life to mastering and you’d be hard-pressed to find a man or woman alive who knows more about the marriage of these two subjects than I do.

Not only have I read thousands of books and studies on botany, cannabis, business, leadership, sales, marketing, mindset, and philosophy and spent tens of thousands of hours with my nose buried in plant research papers, I’ve tested every business strategy and growing method you can imagine. I even ran extensive cannabis testing for the British Columbia Institute of Technology (BCIT) and the University of Canada (UBC).

I was the technical consultant for the hit Showtime series Weeds and the movie Pineapple Express.

I employ a team of 23 full-time PhDs, as well as hundreds of growers from across the globe, all working their asses off to help me take marijuana to its true genetic potential.

About BigMike Straumietis

If you grow or consume marijuana, you've benefited from something BigMike has done.

Since 1983, BigMike Straumietis has worked tirelessly to find new ways
to bring marijuana to its true genetic potential-legally and illegally. He's overseen
the cultivation of over a million pot plants, been the target of a federal manhunt
by the DEA and U.S. Marshals, lived on the lam for almost a decade under seven
different identities, and brought over 50 firsts to the world of marijuana growing.
In 1996, BigMike took $25,000 he'd made from a small illegal grow in Temecula,
California, snuck into Canada with a fake passport and built a growing and
trafficking organization 200 people strong. He then used his growing and
business expertise to start his company, Advanced Nutrients. Today,
Advanced Nutrients is the maker of the #1 selling cannabis-specific
nutrient line in the world, with over $105 million a year in sales from
over 100 countries.

When he's not figuring out ways to grow bigger and better buds, throwing
parties at his world famous marijuana mansion, or running Advanced Nutrients,
BigMike dabbles in creating social change. His charity Holiday Heroes feeds
over 26 thousand people in need, each Easter and Christmas. Mike created
the political party, Nova Bulgaria, in order to create real change in the corrupt
government of Bulgaria. Advanced Nutrients donated over a million dollars
worth of nutrients to assist sick and dying patients, built a classroom in
Uganda, and constructed a grow room for CannaMoms, to allow children who
suffer from conditions such as epilepsy and cancer access to the medicine
they need. Advanced Nutrients also lends seed money to individuals in
developing countries who dream of starting a small business, but lack the
means to do so, donate heavily to the Marijuana Policy Project, and are
spearheading MMJ Bulgaria, which advocates for Medical Marijuana
legalization in Bulgaria.